


7x09: The Soul of the Madman Blake

by OsleyaKomWonkru



Series: OsleyaKomWonkru's Season 7 of The 100 [9]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Blake sibling feels, Episode: s06e13 The Blood of Sanctum, Flashbacks, Gen, Memories, Post-Episode: s06e13 The Blood of Sanctum, Reconciliation, The 100 (TV) Season 7 Speculation, The Anomaly - Freeform, shared mindspace, time dilation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-07
Updated: 2020-05-14
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:08:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 14,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24060349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OsleyaKomWonkru/pseuds/OsleyaKomWonkru
Summary: Taken by Cadogan and imprisoned deep within his own mind, Bellamy is forced to confront his past with his sister for once and for all. Then as he faces off against the man responsible for all of the circumstances of their existence, Bellamy must make the final choice - will he make history repeat itself, or will he break the cycle?16 weeks. 16 episodes. An entire fan-created speculative version of season 7. Each episode will have four chapters, posted once per day from Thursday to Sunday.
Relationships: Bellamy Blake & Bill Cadogan, Bellamy Blake & Hope Diyoza, Bellamy Blake & Octavia Blake, Octavia Blake & Hope Diyoza
Series: OsleyaKomWonkru's Season 7 of The 100 [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1595290
Comments: 15
Kudos: 31





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to Episode 9! [Read Episodes 1-8 here](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1595290) if you're just joining us.
> 
> Quarantine brain is real, y'all. I had a huge creative block, and this is such a pivotal episode, and I'm sorry it took so long to get it out. But here we have it. Finally. Rest of the season should be easier from here on out.
> 
> The title of this episode is from the poem "Mad Blake" by William Rose Benet.
> 
> In case anyone needs a refresher: _Ani_ is Trig for "aunt" and is what Hope calls Octavia. _Hofi_ is Trig-ish for "hope" and is what Octavia calls Hope. Other Trig is translated inline. _Habibti_ means "my beloved" in Arabic and is what Inanna uses as a term of endearment for Hope. Echo is now known as Ash.

**_OMPHALOS - FOREST ABOVE OCTAVIA’S LAB - DAWN_ **

_“They took Bellamy.”_

Hope’s words echoed in Octavia’s head as all other sounds and voices faded away.

Did Cadogan _know?_ Did Cadogan know that Bellamy was the key? Had he known this whole time, and that’s why he took him, to prevent her from being able to tell him what his mission was and only then sending him into the belly of the beast, as it were?

Then a more important question: _How did Cadogan know that Hope and Bellamy would be there?_

Octavia tried to clear her mind, to return to the world around her, to focus, _dammit,_ and figure out the situation.

Dr Warner and the medical team had arrived, and a bevy of doctors examined Hope. They declared her in good health, nothing was damaged or broken, the enemy had just knocked her out with one of Cadogan’s drugs.

“I’m sorry, _ani.”_ Hope sobbed, clutching onto Octavia’s shoulder. “I tried to stop them. I tried to save him. I’m sorry I couldn’t.”

“It’s not your fault, _Hofi.”_ Octavia soothed her, rubbing slow circles on her back as she had when Hope had been a child and had nightmares of her own. “It’s not your fault. But we’ll find out whose fault it is and make sure they tell us everything we need to know to get him back.”

“I understand now why you love him so much. We were stuck in the quicksand, during the red sun, and - and he saved me. I thought the red sun toxin wouldn’t affect me, but away from the Anomaly it did, and - and I tried to kill myself. But as he was affected by the toxin he fought through the memories of that memory bead and somehow that - that cleared his mind. He finally _saw._ And he saved me.”

“That’s the brother I remember.” Octavia murmured. “That’s who I’ve always tried to remember him as.”

“Can I come back now, _ani?_ Please. You promised.”

“Of course you can.” Octavia kissed Hope’s cheek, wiping Hope’s tears away even as new tears threatened to roll down her own cheeks. “I’m so proud of you, _ai Hofi. Ai hod yu in toli. (I love you so much.)_ You know that never changed, right?” 

“I know. I never doubted that.”

“Good. Now let’s get downstairs. Connect you again.” Octavia’s expression hardened. “And talk to Miller, because I have a feeling that it is his fault that my brother is gone.”

**_OMPHALOS - CADOGAN’S MANSION - DAWN_ **

Bellamy came to slowly, feeling restraints holding his body down, knowing that moving would be futile, and so he kept his eyes closed as he processed what he remembered.

He’d been drawn in by the Anomaly. He knew, intellectually, that the voices he’d been hearing - Octavia’s voice, over and over, in many different places and times - hadn’t been real. That they’d been illusions created by the toxin. But in that moment it hadn’t mattered, and he had to go.

Murphy had tried to stop him, but the Anomaly differential knocked him out cold. After tripping over Murphy, he’d been kept down by Hope until an earthquake hit, at which point he’d bolted for the Anomaly and Hope followed him.

Knowing there was no taking him back at that point, Hope guided them through, and they emerged from the Anomaly on the edge of a city. Bellamy had marveled at the sight of it for about three seconds, before he noticed the people coming out of the forest on either side of them, including a man with long silver hair and eagle-sharp eyes who made Hope’s eyes widen in panic.

“We have to go back. We have to go back _now.”_ Hope had whispered, trying to pull Bellamy back into the Anomaly, but they were too slow and the people grabbed them. Hope fought like a wildcat to free herself, but to no avail, they were too many.

“Well well well.” The man in front of them had said. “Take the man. Leave the girl where they’ll find her. If we have him, we don’t need her anymore.”

“No!” Hope had yelled, renewing her efforts to fight them off, and Bellamy followed her lead, though it was fruitless, and the last thing he remembered was watching someone plunge a needle into Hope’s neck and her going slack in their grip.

The same must have been done to him, because the next moment he remembered was this one, in the custody of people who managed to scare even Hope - a girl raised by his sister and Diyoza to be just as fearless as them.

This must have been Father William - _Bill Cadogan,_ Murphy had said, the name from Earth before the bombs that Hope hadn’t known, the man who had built the Second Dawn Bunker and killed Becca, his own sister.

“I know you’re awake, Mr Blake.” Came Cadogan’s voice. “You may as well open your eyes so that we can have a chat.”

Bellamy kept them closed. “I have nothing to say to you.”

“Oh, I beg to differ. We have a lot to talk about. We have a lot in common, you and I. We share many of the same burdens. Not many can say that they’ve spent their lives caring for a secret little sister and then having that hard work thrown back in their faces.”

“I’m nothing like you.”

“Aren’t you? I’ve seen the recordings. Right in that same office where I decided my sister’s fate, you fed your malnourished sister poison that almost killed her.”

_Recordings?_

Bellamy opened his eyes reluctantly, his gaze meeting the eagle-sharp look of Cadogan next to him. “What the hell do you mean, recordings?”

“Omphalos keeps watch on the areas around the keystones.” Cadogan said. “There were cameras all throughout the bunker. I know every minute of your sister’s life down there. Which is more than you can say. You know very little.”

“I know that what happened down there stayed with her for years. I know that it hurt her deeply. I know that I hurt her even more when I thought I was saving her. I understand that now, so whatever you _think_ we have in common, we don’t.”

“You were trying to save her, Mr Blake. Save her from her own demons. A pity she didn’t appreciate that. You’re welcome, by the way.”

“Is there something you think I should be thanking you for?”

“I removed that monstrosity from your neck. You won’t be tormented by whatever memories she put in your head anymore.”

“Hope did that, not Octavia.”

“Hope worships your sister. Blind faith like that is dangerous.”

“Octavia didn’t ask her to do that. In fact Octavia punished her for doing so. My sister is not who you think she is.”

“I know her better than you do. What your sister is doing is dangerous, Mr Blake. You’ve seen what mixing humanity and technology has done. You know better than most. You’ve seen my sister’s work.”

“I’ve seen your sister’s work be corrupted and misused and turned into the opposite of what she was trying to do with it.” Bellamy said firmly.

“The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” Cadogan said. “You of all people should know that.”

“I do. But from what I’ve heard and seen, what my sister has been doing for the past fifteen years has only brought peace and prosperity.”

“It only takes one to misuse it.”

“Like Sheidheda?” Bellamy asked. “One of the Commanders who had the Flame. Heard of him?”

“I’ve heard whispers. He was weak and hungered for power instead of fulfilling his duty to destroy the Flame. That’s my point. Humanity cannot be joined with technology in such ways. It encourages that kind of hubris.”

“Is that what you think?”

“It’s what I know. It hurt me deeply to kill my sister, I thought by doing so that I was putting an end to all of her technology, but even from beyond the grave it continues to haunt these worlds. So I ask of you a grave task. To finish what I started, put an end to her technology and your sister’s technology at the same time. If you can do that, then perhaps yours will see reason, and her life can be spared in a way that my sister’s could not.”

“You really think I’m going to help you?”

“You will. After you see what is in store for you should your sister’s technology be allowed to overrun yet another world.”

Cadogan stood up, picking up a syringe from the table next to him. “This will show you the truth. The dark secrets hidden within your sister’s _gift_ to the universe.”

Bellamy tried to squirm away as Cadogan approached with the syringe, but there was nowhere for him to go, and the needle plunged deep into his neck.

All he felt was his eyes drift closed, sending him into a waking dream, even as his body convulsed against the restraints holding it down.

**_OMPHALOS - OCTAVIA’S LAB - DAWN_ **

Octavia stormed down the stairs into her lab, Ash and Gaia close on her heels, the others following behind. She scanned the main room, finding it empty, and crossed the space to the bedroom, flinging the door open.

Miller sat on the edge of the bed, expression inscrutable.

“Why?” Octavia demanded. “What did Cadogan promise you that you were willing to sell out your people?”

“You’re not my people anymore, Octavia. In time Jackson will see that too.”

“I’m not talking about me.” Octavia snapped. “Because of you, Cadogan now has Bellamy. Who knows what he’s doing to him. Whatever you did delivered _my_ brother and _my_ child into the hands of the enemy.” Octavia paused to take a breath and compose herself. “You’re lucky he didn’t harm Hope. If he had, we’d be having a very different conversation.”

“So, that’s all it takes to get Blodreina to come back?” Miller said, not denying anything, but standing up and getting into Octavia’s personal space, staring her down. “You say you’ve spent twenty years changing, but here you are, threatening lives again.”

“Forgiveness needs to be earned.” Ash said, stepping up next to Octavia and forcibly moving Miller back. “It does not belong to those who still fight for the enemy.”

Miller sat back down on the bed, hard, as Ash stepped between him and Octavia. Octavia winced, rubbing her temple.

“What’s wrong?” Niylah asked, by her side almost immediately.

“I don’t know, just a - just a sudden headache. I’m sure it will pass, I -” Octavia’s sentence cut off abruptly as her eyes rolled back in her head and she began to convulse. Niylah caught her before she could collapse to the floor.

“Bring back the doctors!” Diyoza yelled down the hall. “Something’s wrong with Octavia.”

Niylah positioned Octavia on her side as her body continued to seize, supporting her head as the doctors rushed into the room.

“What happened?” Dr Warner demanded to know.

“She got a sudden headache, and - and then this started.” Niylah said.

“Clear the room.” Dr Warner said. “We’ll need the bed. Take the prisoner somewhere else.”

Ash pulled Miller back to his feet and shoved him out the door. As the convulsions stopped, Niylah and Dr Warner observed Octavia carefully, but when she didn’t wake, they lifted her up gently and laid her out on the bed.

“I can’t reach her.” Niylah said, voice growing serious. “She said even when asleep, we should be able to connect somehow. Is that true?”

“Yes.” Dr Warner said, closing her eyes and concentrating on the connection. “I feel her spirit, as it were, but she’s not… she’s not accessible. Not like using blockers, because I can still feel her mind, but she’s been isolated somehow. I’ve never seen anything like it. There’s another presence surrounding her that isn’t one of us.”

“Like when Sheidheda was isolating the other Commanders in the Flame?” Madi asked. “When he wouldn’t let me communicate with them?”

“I don’t know the specifics of those technologies, but I’ve heard the basics, and yes, that sounds like a possibility. But even though Octavia has many connections, more than anyone else, there shouldn’t be anything in the network that could affect her but not the rest of us. Something like this should not be possible.”

“Let me feel.” Hope said, shouldering the others out of the way to sit down on the bed next to Octavia. _“Ani_ said I could come back. You all heard her. Give me her blood again. I can find out what’s wrong.”

“Hope, if Octavia’s been compromised somehow, giving you her blood right now could do the same to you.” Diyoza cautioned.

“I have to try. After everything she’s risked for me, for us, I have to. Please, mother. I have to do it.”

“If anything happens to you…”

“Have some faith, mother.” Hope said, kissing Diyoza’s cheek. “This world never gives us a challenge we can’t handle.”

“My brave girl.” Diyoza smiled fondly, tucking Hope’s hair behind her ear. “You come back to me, you hear? Both of you need to come back.”

“We will.” Hope turned to Dr Warner. “Please. Prepare her blood for me.”

Dr Warner nodded quickly, reaching for her kit and pulling out a syringe. Octavia didn’t react when the needle slipped into her vein, withdrawing a small amount of blood. Hope held out her arm and Diyoza clutched her daughter’s other hand tightly, hoping that it would go smoothly, hoping that Hope was right and that she could find what the problem was, that she could help Octavia and bring her back - and, of course, come back herself.

Hope’s eyes widened as the tech settled back into the familiar parts of her veins, feeling all of her connections flooding back like a tidal wave. Inanna appeared next to Hope almost instantaneously, and Hope breathed a sigh of relief, pulling her into a tight hug.

“I feel you again.” Hope whispered. “I missed you so much.”

“I missed you too, _habibti.”_ Inanna murmured, pulling back from the hug to give Hope a soft kiss. “But right now you have a job to do.”

“Yeah.” Hope said, wiping away happy tears, relieved at being connected again, but her smile faded as she turned to face Octavia again. “I don’t feel myself being pulled into whatever is holding _ani’s_ mind prisoner, but I do need to concentrate, so please, if everyone could clear the room.”

Dr Warner and Diyoza began to shoo the others out of the room, and Niylah moved to follow them, albeit reluctantly, but Hope caught her by the wrist.

“Not you. You stay.” Hope said. _“Ani_ never knew how to say it, but she trusted you above all others. You should be here.”

Niylah nodded and took a seat on Octavia’s other side, where she watched some silent communication pass between Hope and Inanna, a conversation she was not privy to, and Inanna nodded as well, taking a seat next to Hope.

“I’m going to be going deeper into our minds than we usually do.” Hope explained. “I need you to keep us grounded. I know you can’t reach her, but feel me and travel along that connection with me, and if you feel anything change in a bad way - and you’ll know if it does - then pull me out immediately. Inanna will help you.”

Hope held a hand out to Niylah, and once their hands were joined, they each took one of Octavia’s. Niylah felt the ghost of Inanna’s hand on her shoulder, the other on Hope’s.

Hope reached out to Niylah with her mind, focusing on the stories that Octavia had told her about her. How they’d saved each other’s lives on Earth. How Niylah had been the only one, save for Hope’s mother, to show Octavia kindness in the wake of their forced departure from Earth.

She felt that warmth and steadiness within Niylah that Octavia had spoken about, and pulled that calm strength along with herself as she reached into Octavia’s mind.

Dr Warner hadn’t recognized the presence in Octavia’s mind, but Hope did as soon as she brushed up against it. It was isolating Octavia’s consciousness at certain intervals, yes, but the reaction between the two minds went deeper than that - at times gentle and soothing, at others explosive and destructive, and the tech that enabled it all sparking angrily against the other, blood making it possible.

The tech was different. But the blood was the same.

Somehow, though Hope didn’t know how it was possible, it was _Bellamy_ within Octavia’s mind.

She pulled back out of the connection, returning to her body and looking up at Niylah and Inanna when they had all settled back into place.

“Bellamy?” Niylah asked. “You think it is Bellamy?”

“I do.” Hope said. “I don’t know how, but - somehow Bellamy is there, using a similar type of tech, but how would he have something like that? Why would Father William give him something like that?”

“When they were in his mansion rescuing your mother, there was some sort of strange tech there.” Niylah said. “I believe Octavia called it fear tech. It took on the appearance of whatever one feared most. It showed Octavia you, dead in front of her. Raven said it worked similarly to our empathy tech.”

“So if Father William injected such tech into Bellamy… it would make sense if he was experiencing his worst fears. But then how would that connect him to _ani?”_

“Maybe she inhaled some of the nano particles while she was there. Then they called to each other, and enhanced by their shared blood… it took her into his fearscape as well.”

“Fearscape?” Hope asked.

“I assume that’s what Bellamy will be experiencing right now. Like our mindspaces, only meant to terrify the visitor instead of helping them to learn about themselves.”

“You are wise. _Ani_ was right to trust you. But now I don’t know what I can do to help her. I think it is out of my hands.”

“You’ve already done what you could to help her. You helped Bellamy understand, didn’t you? That will be their best weapon in there, the way they’ll be able to fight back against those who would trap them there.”

“I know what Bellamy told me about what he now believes about _ani,_ but I don’t know if he’ll be able to say it to her.”

“We have to hope he will, otherwise I don’t know how either of them will come out of this.” Niylah reached over and brushed Octavia’s hair back from her face. “Talking to each other has never been their strong suit. But now it might be the only thing that saves them.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Warning:** Cannibalism and mentions of self-harm in this chapter.
> 
> The song Bellamy hears is indeed the Wonkru anthem, called "Osleya gon rouz" (A Champion in Red), you can listen to it on YouTube [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JRrdq1Nh4A).

**_BELLAMY’S MINDSPACE - THE ARK - EVENING_ **

Bellamy came to with a gasp, chest heaving as he bolted upright, smacking his head on the metal grid above his head. He saw stars as he groaned and rubbed his forehead, but they vanished as quickly as they appeared, the pain disappearing too.

That’s wasn’t normal.

He surveyed his immediate surroundings, confused by what he saw. He was back on the Ark. _The Ark,_ not just the Ring - back in his family’s quarters in Section 17, in Factory Station, where he’d lived for most of his life with his mother and his sister.

Until one foolish misstep had torn them both away from him.

But how was he back here now?

Bellamy got out of his bunk, stepping into the rest of their room and he knew at once he _couldn’t_ be back - not only because the Ark no longer existed, but because what he saw was not something that the Ark ever had.

_Is this a dream?_ Bellamy wondered. _This feels more real than a dream. All of this… all of this has to mean something more._

Cadogan had said this would show him the dark side of Octavia’s technology. For all that he didn’t believe that, it still meant it would have some sort of mind connection, some sort of space within minds… that was it.

_This is my mindspace._ Bellamy thought. _Like Murphy said about his mindspace experience, there’s something that I need to resolve._

He turned his attention to the six statues in front of him. Like the marble statues of the ancients that he’d seen pictures of growing up, of gods and heroes and villains and all manner of characters of the ancient world. Except none of these statues wore the face of some ancient gods or beings. 

They were all Octavia, in different mythological scenarios.

The first, a young girl pressed to an altar, about to be sacrificed - _Iphigenia,_ he remembered the name from the stories.

The second, a young woman shielding another with her body, protecting them from the onslaught of others - _Antigone,_ the next name came to his mind.

The third, a proud Amazon queen, weapons at the ready, ready to slay those who had wronged her and her sisters - _Penthesilea,_ a skilled swordswoman.

The fourth, standing tall with the scales of justice hanging from one hand and a sword in the other - _Themis,_ the personification of justice and law.

The fifth, chained to a rock and suffering in pain from the beaks of the eagles, suffering for bringing the gifts of the gods to mankind - a female _Prometheus,_ the name Bellamy himself had used for his sister.

The sixth, another figure in agony, reaching for sustenance only to be denied it, living in eternal torment - a female _Tantalus,_ banished to the darkest corners of Tartarus for his crimes of cannibalism and familicide.

All of them wearing his sister’s face.

Bellamy approached the statues, but found his way blocked by some sort of invisible force. No matter how much he tried to push against it, it wouldn’t budge. He could see the statues, but he couldn’t go near them.

“What’s the meaning of this?” Bellamy asked out loud to the room, not that there was anyone else there to hear it. His voice echoed through the room, the constant machine hum of the Ark ever-present too, but if he listened closely, he could hear some other sound as well, though where it was coming from, he couldn’t tell for certain.

It was a woman’s voice, though it wasn’t Octavia’s, that much he knew. The voice was singing, and if he concentrated, he could hear snatches of the song -

_…‘so ona trikova, ba ha na kik raun riskiwe…  
(We were cast in shadow, but how to live inside the dark)_

_…soncha kik thru, noda raz, Osleya gon rouz…  
(A light breaks through, another dawn, a champion in red)_

_…souda drop ‘so leda klin, hed dropon daun, teik emo in…  
(We must shed our skin, mourn the fallen, bear their loss)_

Bellamy realized he’d heard the melody before, though not the words - back in the Second Dawn bunker, while waiting for his turn in the arena. It must have been Wonkru’s anthem, making reference to Octavia’s victory in the Conclave and the ever-present _red_ of her wardrobe as the Red Queen, a proud statement of defiance against the tradition of Nightblood rule.

A world and six years that he knew nothing about, as Hope had made clear to him. He’d heard bits and pieces from other members of Wonkru, from Indra, from Abby, but how many of them had had the full story? If Hope was to be believed, none of them did.

But how could he know those stories here? If that’s what he needed to learn, what hope did he have to do so within his own mind?

Though he hadn’t had the words of this song in his mind either, yet somehow they were there. 

The song faded out from Bellamy’s surroundings, but he could still hear it, localized somewhere behind him. He stepped away from the invisible barrier to look for the source of it, somehow knowing it would be the key he needed.

He bumped into the table, and it made a screeching noise as metal grated against metal. It jarred the notes of the song, and that’s when Bellamy noticed his tablet sitting on the table.

The source of the song.

Bellamy picked up the tablet, and the song faded out. 

An image of his sister’s face filled the screen, Octavia as she looked now, not as he saw her in the representations of the statues.

“This isn’t what Cadogan intended.” She whispered at him, looking around furtively, though at what, he couldn’t see. “This is in fact the opposite. But I still can’t talk for long. The path to the future goes through the past. Trust in the memories. Trust in _me._ Please.”

Then she was gone as quickly as she’d appeared.

Octavia’s face was replaced by what appeared to be a usual tablet menu, but the options weren’t any that he’d ever seen before. Instead of programs or books - Bellamy’s most common use of the tablet when he’d lived on the Ark - the menu was ordered by the different eras of his sister’s life, starting with “The Girl Under the Floor”, following on through “Blodreina” and many more afterward, a stark reminder that Octavia had lived in Omphalos longer than she’d lived with him.

Bellamy took the tablet back to the invisible barrier, considering the correlations between the statues and the categories, sensing that they were connected in some way. But there were only six statues, and the list went on beyond that.

Was he meant to go through the entirety of his sister’s life? See all of her experiences? That seemed far too extensive, not digging down to the root of what he needed to learn, but he was at a loss for how to approach it otherwise.

Bellamy looked back down at the tablet, and saw that the category headings he’d seen had vanished, replaced by new ones, such as “Hope”, “Joy”, “Regret” and other emotions.

That held better possibilities. While he was certain that his focus would need to be on the darker emotions, he reasoned that it would be fair to balance those with some happier memories as well, perhaps one they shared, a glimpse of their lives before the world turned them upside down.

He tapped the option for “Hope” and was presented with a dozen more possibilities. The first one said “Unity”, and as Bellamy tapped it, he felt the floor fall out from underneath his feet.

* * *

Bellamy fell through the darkness for only a few seconds before he landed firmly in the throne room of the Commanders, at the top of the Polis tower. He saw Kane to his left, but the man didn’t give any indication that he saw him, his eyes drawn instead to the doors opening slowly, everyone in the room holding their breath, waiting to see who was on the other side.

 _The Conclave._ Bellamy thought. _This is what I missed after Jaha kidnapped me and took me to the bunker._

Octavia came in through the doors, blood streaking her face, a makeshift bandage wrapped around her left arm. Her eyes blazed with a weary determination as she made her way to the front of the room, dropping the sigils of the fallen at Gaia’s feet.

Gaia announced Octavia’s victory with a tone of awe and surprise, a surprise that turned into confusion shared by everyone in the room when Octavia said that no, the bunker didn’t belong to “her” people.

Bellamy watched as the weariness in his sister’s eyes turned to a passionate fire, as she spoke of the bunker belonging to all of them, and that they would survive Praimfaya together. _Ogeda._

As the room took up the chant, he moved unseen through the crowd, coming closer as Octavia collapsed into Indra’s arms, the fire vanishing as a tear rolled down her cheek at the mention of Lincoln’s name. There was pain in her eyes now, but also hope. Hope for a world beyond clan distinctions, a world where humanity could be one.

Bellamy faded back to their family quarters on the Ark as Kane, Octavia, Indra and Gaia dashed out of the throne room, headed to the bunker. He knew what they’d find there, that wasn’t new to him.

Unity had always been so important to Octavia. How could it not - after not belonging to a society besides her family, she forged her own belonging in building something new. Then after that had disintegrated before her eyes, she’d been thrust into a whole new society in Omphalos where unity was once again her answer to the ills of humanity, but this time not just in one place, but across many worlds.

Bellamy looked back down at the tablet in his hand, switching categories to “Joy”, selecting the option of “Elation”. He couldn’t think of many moments in his sister’s life that it could apply to, but he could think of one in his - when the door of the dropship opened on Earth to so many new possibilities.

Perhaps Octavia shared that moment.

* * *

Right away, Bellamy knew it wasn’t what he was expecting. He was in a homey living room, something he only recognized from the movies of Earth before the bombs, not the stark metal of the Ark or Arkadia. Snow tapped lightly against the windowpanes behind him, and there was a roaring fireplace not far off.

Octavia and Diyoza sat on a blanket in front of the fireplace, a baby Hope crawling around between them. Bellamy watched with a fond smile as Hope pulled herself up to standing using Octavia’s knee, smacking one of her tiny hands into Octavia’s nose as she steadied herself.

“A-ni.” Hope babbled. “A-ni.”

“Yes, that’s your auntie Octavia.” Diyoza encouraged. “Can you say auntie?”

“A-ni.”

_“Ani’s_ perfect.” Octavia said softly, her smile wider than Bellamy had ever seen it. “That’s how you say aunt in Trig.” She swept Hope off her feet and into her lap, tickling the little girl’s belly as she giggled and squirmed. “I’m going to have fun teaching you Trig. It’ll be our own secret language.”

“Hey.” Diyoza protested, but she was also hiding a smile.

“We can teach Mommy too. If she says please.”

“Pweeeeeez.” Hope exclaimed, sitting up and tucking her head under Octavia’s chin. “Pweeeeeeeeez.”

Bellamy looked on as Octavia took Hope’s hands in hers, leading her through a game of patty-cake with Diyoza, remembering when Octavia had been that small and how different everything had been. They’d played, sure, but always quiet, so quiet, lest someone hear her. Songs had been right out, their day to day life ruled by fear and the clock tick-tick-ticking down to inspections, never anything as carefree as Hope’s joyful giggles. Now to see Octavia at such peace, at ease and _relaxed_ in a way he’d never seen… it stung, to know he hadn’t been a part of it.

Perhaps he hadn’t deserved to be.

He was firmly in the grip of melancholy as his access to this joyful moment of his sister’s life ended and he found himself back on the Ark. He ran his finger down through the different categories and suboptions, his finger pressing down on “Forsaken” long enough that the word blinked back and forth at a furious pace.

Bellamy didn’t know what that meant, but he was sure it wasn’t good.

* * *

“No way. I won’t take away their choice. When they’re hungry enough they’ll eat.”

Bellamy felt himself speak the words, but the voice was Octavia’s. _What’s going on now?_

He was in the bunker. Abby was sitting in front of him. Octavia was nowhere to be seen, until he looked down and realized he _was_ Octavia. A terror and despair that he didn’t understand welled up inside him, feelings that _she_ must have had in this moment, this moment that he had yet to make sense of.

He turned his attention to Abby as she spoke. “Listen to me. Nobody wants to do this. But we can’t let them starve. If they die from malnutrition, their muscles will atrophy and there won’t be enough meat on their bones -”

His - _her?_ \- hand shot out, stopping Abby right there. “I can’t hear this.”

Abby wouldn’t be deterred, rising to her feet. “You have to hear this. On the Ark, the Blight generation, they had a choice, and they never recovered from it. The people who ate had to watch the people who didn’t eat die slowly. And their guilt nearly destroyed them.”

“What do you want me to do? Make it a crime not to be a cannibal?”

That was it then. Bellamy watched in horror as Abby nodded, and he tried to tune out the rest of what she was saying as the crushing despair washed over him, wave after wave after wave, as Octavia collapsed into a chair, bringing him along in a way that he couldn’t comprehend. He wasn’t just _witnessing_ the memory, he was _feeling_ it.

Bellamy remembered the scene that Murphy had described, with the guns and the human meat and the terror of it all. How that experience had been enough to put Murphy firmly on Octavia’s side. He thought he knew what was coming next.

But nothing could prepare him for the reality.

His heart - or was it hers? - clenched as she spoke the words at the head table, cradling the cube of human flesh in her hands with reverence. “We honour those who died so we could live. I give all of myself to you. You know that. And so did they.”

Bellamy wasn’t sure if it was his gag reflex or hers that was struggling to swallow the mouthful they took. But his horror over the meat in his mouth was soon eclipsed by the sight that there was still an entire table or two that wouldn’t eat.

There was no place for him to run, he was trapped in his sister’s body as she walked over to them. As she asked them nicely to eat the meat in front of them. As she begged them.

As she shot them.

He felt her spirit shatter as the first bullet hit the man’s chest. The tears streaming down her cheeks as the second tore through a woman’s. The chilling ice filling her heart as the third took down a second man.

Kane ate. She lowered the gun with a brief flutter of relief, looking back towards Abby for some measure of reassurance.

But Abby didn’t even look at her. She said nothing. Did nothing.

That was why this memory was labeled Forsaken, Bellamy realized, as he returned to his own body back on the Ark, sobbing and shaking. This wasn’t him and Clarke pulling the lever in Mount Weather _together._ Abby had gotten what she wanted. Kane was alive. What it cost Octavia to make that happen was inconsequential.

He retreated to a corner away from the statues, hugging his knees to his chest as he tried to look objectively at what he’d witnessed, with the eye of the outsider that had heard the manufactured story of the Dark Year from Abby while in Sanctum, but he no longer could. Not after feeling what his sister had felt. Not after knowing the real truth.

And he’d called her the Queen of Cannibals. So cavalierly, as if it was just another day, another epithet, as if it was something she’d been proud of rather than it being her greatest sorrow.

_“If they admit the truth, their lives mean nothing. That’s why I burnt the farm.”_ Octavia’s words to him when they’d been in the Sanctum palace, before going to save the tavern.

Bellamy filled in the blanks now. _“If I accepted a solution that meant continuing to live with that farm, that farm that had failed and forced us to do the unspeakable, everything I did to save my people meant nothing.”_

Knowing what he knew now, he couldn’t say that he wouldn’t have burned that farm too.

“I’m so sorry, O.” Bellamy said out loud. “I don’t know if you can hear me. I don’t even know if you’re here or not. And I’ll tell you again when I see you, but I am so sorry. I’m sorry I judged you before I tried to understand what you went through.”

He set the tablet down and squeezed his eyes shut, trying to compose himself, trying to find a stillness within himself to be able to continue, to be able to go on and see more that he needed to understand. How she had lived like this he couldn’t comprehend.

She hadn’t wanted to, the cold realization struck him. With the horror of the memory of the Dark Year, Bellamy had completely forgotten about Hope’s memory, that he’d experienced over and over again, of the little girl witnessing Octavia carving a knife through her skin as Diyoza tried desperately to stop her.

He’d told Gabriel that he didn’t know why Hope would want him to see Octavia cutting herself. But now he did. Now the understanding was all too real.

Bellamy picked up the tablet again, knowing he owed it both to Octavia and to Hope to keep going. They hadn’t been able to check out of their circumstances, escape from their memories. He couldn’t dishonour them by doing so now.

There was a whole category devoted to Betrayal, and Bellamy tapped the first suboption without even reading it, letting his finger rest on it until it pulsed a number of times, just like the last one.

He knew what it would be.

* * *

But to his surprise, he was wrong. Bellamy had expected to find himself in Octavia’s office, about to poison her, or even back in that cave after Lincoln’s death. Perhaps even something more recent such as when she’d learned the truth about Omphalos.

He hadn’t expected to find himself facing himself across a room in the ruins of Polis, just minutes after she’d been freed from the bunker. This day was mere weeks earlier - for him. For her it was even longer, and Bellamy couldn’t think of why this would remain as an iconic moment in her memory when compared to others.

Then he felt the sting of his words. _“… because it looks to me like someone read Ovid a few too many times -”_

_I didn’t even let her talk before I judged._ Bellamy thought. _I took one look into the bunker and thought I had all the answers. No wonder she didn’t want to talk to me, tell me what they’d been through._

The betrayal Octavia felt had started here. Not when he’d demanded clemency for Echo. Not when he’d helped Clarke murder Cooper. Not when he’d poisoned her.

It was here. Where it wouldn’t have cost him anything to be kind. Where if he had been kind, who knows what kind of difference it could have made. Perhaps she wouldn’t have been as desperate to get to the Valley in any way possible. Perhaps she wouldn’t have taken drastic measures. Perhaps he wouldn’t have taken drastic counter-measures.

Perhaps they wouldn’t be where they were now.

Appearing back in their room on the Ark, Bellamy noticed that some of the statues were beginning to change. He could see the Promethean Octavia gaining colour where before she’d been solid white marble. The Iphigenian Octavia, while still white marble, now sat on her altar in a meditative pose, no longer pinned as an imminent sacrifice.

“The path to the future goes through the past.” Bellamy said to himself, repeating Octavia’s words from her video message. “That’s why there’s only six of them. The cycle begins again from the beginning. Rebirth from the darkness into a new innocence in the light.”

He was sure he saw the Iphigenian Octavia nod at him.

Being involved in Hope’s childhood had done more than just make his sister _happy,_ Bellamy realized. It had helped heal her childhood trauma, not to mention grounding her in a present where she was able to build a new life.

He surveyed the statues again, contemplating the last one. If what he’d seen of her life in the bunker and once it had opened was bringing the Promethean Octavia into colour, that meant that the final statue in the series was in a time period beyond that, but still before Hope’s birth - which Bellamy knew to be the day that Octavia passed through the Anomaly.

Eternal torment for one’s crimes and being denied the necessities of life, Bellamy thought back to the myth that encapsulated the Tantalean Octavia.

The crimes he’d judged without understanding. The judgment he’d cast on her when casting her out into exile.

Looking down at the tablet again, Bellamy scrolled through the category of Regret, tapping once on the suboption Shame.

* * *

He expected to be taken to the forests of Planet Alpha, and was shocked instead to find himself in the mess hall of the _Eligius IV._ Octavia was laying back on a table, her anger and frustration palpable. The few dozen remaining members of Skaikru were scattered throughout the room, including Abby and Jordan. Niylah sat on the steps, looking off into the distance.

Octavia surged to her feet, kicking at the locked, solid, metal door. After insulting Jordan and the others in the room, he watched one of them throw a punch at her, then more. Two of the crowd held a screaming Niylah back, while the others tossed his sister into a railing and then to the ground, where she didn’t resist or fight back as they kicked and beat her bloody, instead laughing as one of the men hauled her to her feet and pressed a knife to her throat.

_“The Queen is dead.”_

_“Wait.”_ Abby finally spoke. _“Let her live with what she’s become.”_

Octavia looked up into the man’s eyes, the challenge evident in her expression, daring him to do it, but he backed down and pushed her away.

_“You want absolution? Take it. Take it.”_ Octavia demanded, throwing her arms out to her sides before collapsing to her knees. _“Please. Please do it.”_ A few sobs, and Bellamy could hear her barely-whispered _“Just do it”_ as she continued to cry.

Bellamy had seen the bruises when she’d arrived in Sanctum, but hadn’t known the story of where they came from. Hadn’t known that she goaded them into attacking her, looking for that sweet release of death.

Hadn’t wanted to know. He’d seen this same scene before - Jasper laughing as an Azgeda scout pressed a knife to his neck. Lost, bereft of all hope, also looking for a way out. Jasper had in the end taken it. Bellamy was thankful that his sister hadn’t.

He thought back to some of his darkest days - _first_ darkest days - when under the influence of the Jobi nuts he’d hallucinated all of those who had died in the Culling, as well as a bleeding Chancellor Jaha. He’d begged for death too and was also denied.

But his had just been a hallucination. A hallucination after which Clarke had given him safe harbour, and a way forward to begin to make up for all of his mistakes. No one had given Octavia that.

Bellamy himself had exiled her into a toxic forest, with no hope or help to speak of.

Brother of the year, he was.


	3. Chapter 3

Bellamy went through memory after memory, happy and horrifying and everything in between, soaking them all in. The statues in front of him in their quarters in the Ark shifted and changed, all of them vibrant and moved from their original positions.

Except for the Themian Octavia. Lady Justice, as she was often called in English, scales in one hand and a sword in the other, was just as solid white and unmoving as she had been when he’d first arrived there.

He was missing something. Something that seemed key to his entire experience here, the key that would set him free.

Hope had been emphasizing how he needed to _see,_ how he needed to _understand_ Octavia, but that there was nothing he could do for her pain because it had already been something she’d healed over the course of years and decades. Hadn’t he done that? But that wasn’t he needed here. His mind was demanding something else from him.

Bellamy surveyed the Themian Octavia, taking in every detail of the marble, down to the grains of the scales in her hand.

Perhaps they weren’t the scales of justice in the story he was now watching unfold, but something else. Scales weighed more than justice, after all. Scales measured weight, scales balanced when they reached an equilibrium.

He returned to the Hope category, which he’d viewed less than the others, believing that more of his necessary understanding would lie in the pain rather than the joy. But with his options growing slim, perhaps this held the key.

His finger hovered over “Freedom”, wondering what it would bring.

* * *

Bellamy entered into the memory with an open mind as to where he’d end up, however the door to Mount Weather hadn’t even registered as a possibility. He looked up to see himself climbing onto the roof of the door to sit next to his sister, and tried to remember what that conversation had been.

It had been so long ago, for both of them, but clearly it held something of value to her, otherwise it wouldn’t be here.

_“Then we can finally get out of here.”_ Octavia said, her expression turning guilty as soon as she realized that she’d spoken the words out loud. _“I’m sorry, Bell. I don’t fit in here.”_

_“If you need to leave, I get that. But you’ll always fit in with me.”_ The Bellamy of that day said, resting his hand on his sister’s.

The scene cut out abruptly, before he saw the other guards bring Echo in, and Bellamy sat back in his chair on the Ark as he tried to figure out what this memory meant.

It was so short, but something about it held immense meaning.

“You’ll always fit in with me.” Bellamy repeated to himself, scoffing a bit. “Except that’s the day when that stopped being true, isn’t it? That can’t be it.”

The memory was labeled “Freedom”. Was it something to do with him giving her the permission to leave? Was that it? Bellamy felt like he was on to something, but he couldn’t quite pin it down yet, and tapped on the next memory, labeled “Inspiration”.

* * *

Bellamy found himself in the main office of the bunker, but not as it had been when they’d opened it, no, this still looked like it had when they’d first found the bunker six years earlier.

Octavia was sitting behind the desk, face bruised and a bit bloody, though cleaned up from whatever caused it. She held a radio in her hand, and he heard his own voice come through it.

_“You’re not that little girl anymore.”_

“Before we went to space.” Bellamy whispered. It all came back to him - the encouragement that he’d given his sister so that she would lead Wonkru, that she wasn’t just a fighter, that she could be more. That she’d given people hope, and now she had to keep that going. Now she had to lead.

_“You’re Prometheus, stealing fire from the gods and giving it back to the human race.”_

_“Prometheus got chained to a rock so that eagles could eat his liver.”_

_“Thanks for ruining my metaphor, O.”_

Bellamy had looked back on this conversation fondly for those six years in space, glad that he had finally mended ties with Octavia, the first time their relationship hadn’t been fraught with tension since that day on the door of Mount Weather.

But now he understood the darker undertones that the metaphor must have taken for Octavia while in the bunker. She _had_ been chained to a rock. Trapped in a bunker, forsaken by those who should have stood by her - including himself, after the bunker was opened - the metaphor had become frighteningly real for her.

And yet, it still had a place in Octavia’s positive memories. Perhaps not for the metaphor, but for the encouragement he’d provided?

Bellamy look back down at the tablet, at the next memory labeled “Trust”, and held his finger down on it, feeling it pulse beneath his touch.

* * *

It was dark, and Bellamy became acutely aware of a knife wound throbbing in Octavia’s left shoulder as he joined this memory with her, crouching in a dark space, hidden from view, sword in her hand.

But _whose_ view was she hidden from? He heard voices not too far off, and focused in on them.

_“You are Azgeda no more.”_ Came Roan’s voice.

_“Sire, wait -”_ Echo protested.

_Octavia was here during the Conclave._ Bellamy thought. _She heard Echo being banished. She heard - she heard what I said to Roan._

Echo walked by, unaware that Octavia was hidden just a few feet away. Bellamy focused back on the conversation between himself and Roan.

_“You really think she can win, don’t you?”_

_“I wouldn’t count her out if I were you. She’s survived harder things than this.”_

_“Before she dies, I’ll tell her she’s lucky to have you as a brother.”_

_“I’ve got a better idea. After she guts you and before you die, you tell her I was the lucky one.”_

Bellamy felt an emotional warmth spread through Octavia’s heart, a smile cross her face, and resolve strengthen within her. He could practically hear her think _he believes in me._

Octavia crawled out of the space, determination strong, ready to go back to war.

* * *

_Think, dammit._ Bellamy had been pacing the floor of their quarters on the Ark for a long time, not digging into any new memories, the tablet long abandoned on the table.

He was convinced he had everything he needed, but the answer still seemed to be just out of reach.

_What did those three memories have in common?_

They were moments when he’d shown _faith_ in her - faith in her judgment, faith in her abilities. When he’d seen her as a person beyond his little sister, not as someone to protect and save, but someone who was capable of doing those things on her own.

That was it.

“I trusted her to make her own choices.” Bellamy said out loud. “I showed her I loved her by letting her go and knowing that she’d make the right decisions.”

The realization that he could only count the number of times that he’d shown this sort of faith in her on one hand almost knocked him to the ground. As it was, he stumbled back to sit down hard in the chair behind him as he watched the marble of Lady Justice melt away.

The other five statues of Octavia faded away, leaving only her, as she stepped down from the podium, setting down the sword and scales, approaching him as the invisible barrier also vanished.

“I just needed to love you.” Bellamy said, looking up at her. “Was it really that simple?”

Octavia nodded. “It was.”

“I always wanted to protect you. But at some point protecting turned into controlling. Then I - I also saw you as a reflection of myself. If you did something I didn’t like, that meant that it was my failing, my mistake and I couldn’t stand to see that. I punished you because I wanted to punish myself. I couldn’t be kind and help you learn from your mistakes because I couldn’t show such kindness to myself and I only saw you as an extension of me. I’m so sorry, O.”

“I forgive you.”

“Are you really here, or are you another projection of my mind?”

“I am here. I don’t know how, but I am. I’m so proud of you, big brother.”

“I’m told you’re older than me now.”

“You’ll never not be my big brother.” Octavia reached her hand out to him, and he took it, getting to his feet. “Your life was defined by mine for so long. I know it wasn’t fair. Neither of us chose that. I know that’s why your life on the Ring was so important to you because for the first time in decades, your life wasn’t defined by mine. That was really powerful for you.”

“Don’t think that I forgot you. I didn’t. I thought about you every day.”

“I know you did.” Octavia gestured over to the tablet on the table. “I’ve been going down memory lane too.”

“You saw my memories?”

“I did. I didn’t get the control that you did, I just - whenever you chose an option, I saw what that was for you. And most of your happiest memories were on the Ring.”

“That doesn’t mean that I didn’t love you, I did, I _do,_ I just -”

“I understand, Bell. You don’t need to explain. After all, most of my happy memories were with Hope in Omphalos.”

“You did good, O. She’s a strong, loyal and fearless kid. I just wish I hadn’t put us both in danger by running into the Anomaly. I don’t know if Cadogan has her, or -”

“She’s safe. She’s with my people. I’m proud of both of you.”

“I’m proud of you too. You were able to do what I wasn’t. Well, I said the words, as we just saw, but - I didn’t apply them as I should have. You let her go to learn from the world instead of coddling her. You told her that you disapproved of her actions, but never that you disapproved of _her._ I… I never got that distinction.”

“You can’t protect someone you love from the world. You can only prepare them for the world.”

“When did you get so wise?”

Octavia gave him a look. “I’ve had time. You’ll catch up.”

Bellamy chuckled. “So what do we do now?”

“Breathe. Enjoy this moment before we have to go back to the world. The world where you have an important mission. It can only be you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Cadogan needs to realize what you have.”

“O, his sister’s dead.”

“Bekka Pramheda’s body may have died over two hundred years ago, but her mind is alive. We don’t know where, but it is. It didn’t die with the Flame. She’s out there, working to protect people from Sheidheda. When Sheidheda is defeated she’ll disappear along with him, but before that happens, Cadogan can reconcile with her. He’s been afraid this whole time to face his past, but it’s not too late for him. The very thing that he feared, tech, is what can give him the closure that he needs. But he won’t understand that unless you can make him do so.”

“How can I do that?”

Octavia rested her hand over his heart. “With this. You’ve always been able to inspire people. They respond to what you say. Clarke calls you the heart, right? Use your heart.”

“The head and the heart.” Bellamy said, looking down. “I thought for so long that those were the key parts of being a leader. But I forgot the most important one.”

“What’s that?”

“The soul. And that’s you. You’ve never forgotten what it means to be human. You’ve never lost your humanity.”

“Bell, I… you saw what I did. Everything that I did in the bunker and out of it. I fell further than any of you. I’m nowhere close to perfect.”

_“Humanity_ isn’t perfect. It is messy and imperfect and that’s what makes it human. That’s what makes _us_ human. Humanity isn’t some perfect sinless state of being. It’s raw and it’s violent and it’s destructive, but it is also healing and love and compassion and everything in between. No one has encompassed that better than you. The rest of us, we’ve - we’ve tried to live in some delusion that what we’ve done isn’t a part of who we are, but it _is_ and there’s no denying that. There’s only learning from it. You’ve understood that from the start.”

Octavia’s lip trembled, and she looked like she was about to cry, even as she looked at him with pure love in her eyes.

“What’s wrong, O?”

“Nothing.” She tried to sniff her tears away. “It’s nothing. I’ve just waited years for this moment. I never thought it would be here, like this, but somehow it feels right.”

“If I’d seen it sooner, maybe it wouldn’t have come to all of this.”

“Maybe. But I wouldn’t change anything. For all the pain that the past has given us, it has brought us here to this moment. This moment where we stand on the brink of a new world free of the horrors of the old one.”

“You really believe that?”

“I do. None of the worlds where my tech has taken hold have wars anymore. Not everyone makes the choice to take it themselves, but its effects are still visible to all. Real peace is possible, Bell. I’ve seen it. I’ve felt it. I want you to feel it too, so that you know how important it is to stop Cadogan.”

“Do you want him to take it? Is that the goal?”

“That’s his choice. I can’t make it for him. All I _want_ is for him to stop threatening, hurting, and killing my people. For life here in Omphalos to return to what it was - minus the isolation from other worlds, of course. But peaceful and without the terror that he’s brought. And that’s up to you. I believe in you, big brother.”

“Even after everything I did?”

“Yes. Forgiveness… doesn’t have to be hard for us.”

“You saw that memory.”

“I did. I’m sorry, for how I treated you after Lincoln died. I know you didn’t want that to happen.”

“As Hope reminded me, sometimes our intentions don’t matter. They can still cause pain and death.”

“They can. But then we do what we can to make things as right as they can be. It’s why I spent so long in Omphalos in the first place. From the very first day I was there, they were able to give me a concrete goal to work towards. Restoring Earth so that I could fulfill the promise I made to my people. It is what kept me going even through all of those hard days. It couldn’t bring back those who died, but it would give those who lived the life they deserved.”

“If you didn’t have your ability to heal, if you were still aging… would you still have done it the way you did? Spent twenty years restoring Earth and only then returned?”

“Yes. Actions show far more than words can. Actions are tangible. Words are ephemeral and easily broken.”

“Didn’t you just say that forgiveness doesn’t have to be hard for us?”

“I did. But forgiveness is the start of making things right, not the end. I know you understand that. I saw it in your memories. You felt so much guilt over the Culling on the Ark that you begged for death from your hallucinations. But then you came out of it, and Clarke forgave you and gave you a path forward. Omphalos gave me a way forward, but it was only after I forgave myself that I was able to fully embrace it.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t give you that.”

“You’re here now. That’s the important part. It’s never too late to do the right thing.”

“Where is _here,_ exactly? Is this my mindspace?”

“Not in the way they manifest with my tech, but yes. What Cadogan gave you was fear tech, not my empathy tech. It was supposed to show you your greatest fears and terrors. It should have overwhelmed you with them, tried to drive you mad, to make you think that that’s what my tech does to people. But somehow, it brought me here instead, and I was able to make this space where we could learn to understand each other.”

“It’s been a long time coming.”

“I love you, big brother.”

“I love you too, O.”

They embraced each other tightly, tears of joy and relief and understanding falling from their eyes onto the other’s shoulders.

Though she didn’t want to interrupt the moment, Octavia felt the tug of impending emergence from a mindspace, and pulled back to look at Bellamy, holding his face in her hands.

“We have to go now. You know what you need to do.”

“What if I can’t do it?”

“You can. You’re Orestes, sent by Apollo to steal an icon of Artemis so that the Furies will no longer torment him for his crimes. Then by doing so, you also set your long-lost and believed-dead sister Iphigenia free from her servitude at the temple in Tauris.”

“Do we know how that myth ended?”

“Doesn’t matter. We write our own stories.”

“May we meet again.”

“We _will_ meet again, big brother. Now go. Save us all.”


	4. Chapter 4

**_OMPHALOS - OCTAVIA’S LAB - EVENING_ **

Octavia came to with a gasp, shooting up to sitting as she took deep breaths to center herself again.

Hope and Niylah, both dozing up against the bed, sat up with a start, leaping to Octavia’s side immediately.

“I’m okay.” Octavia assured them. “I’m okay. Everything’s going to be okay.”

“Hope said that it was Bellamy in your mind.” Niylah said. “Is that true?”

“I’m not sure if he was in my mind so much as we were… sharing a mind? It’s hard to explain. We may have been in his mind or mine or both, but it doesn’t matter. Everything’s going to be all right.”

“But Father William has Bellamy.” Hope said. “He won’t let him go without a fight.”

“We don’t need a fight. Bellamy knows what he has to do.”

“Were you able to talk to him?” Niylah asked.

“I was. But before that - how long was I out?”

“Two days.” Hope said. “Everyone’s been so worried.”

“We spent a lot of time in memories. I saw his, he saw mine. Like when I was sharing memories with Murphy. Bellamy chose the type of memory, and - we’d each see what that was for the other. Once he solved the mystery he needed to solve, then the barriers between our minds dissolved and we were able to talk.”

“What mystery did he need to solve?” Hope asked.

“Love.” Octavia said simply. “He needed to understand that love was the answer.”

“What was the question?” Niylah asked, brow furrowed in confusion.

“Our relationship has never been easy. I know he’s always loved me, but that’s often manifested as control, because he didn’t know how to let go. He didn’t know how to separate me from himself. He’s understanding now.”

“He said something like that to me when we were in the quicksand.” Hope said. “He told me that it was one of his biggest regrets that because he couldn’t save you, he didn’t know how to help you.”

“It’s all water under the bridge now.” Octavia said, wiping away a tear even as more spilled down her cheeks. “Once he makes Father William see, then we’ll all be together again.”

“Then why the tears?” Niylah asked. “There’s something you’re not telling us.”

“Something I couldn’t tell him.” Octavia said with a tone of infinite sadness. “He can never join us. Physically, of course he can, once Father William frees him, but he can never be one of us.”

“The tech you were worried about.” Niylah said slowly. “That would destroy the network.”

Octavia nodded. “It didn’t work when he tried to use Miller. But he’s put it in Bellamy, and I could feel it, hunting me, when I was - wherever I was.”

“Niylah thought it had to do with the fear tech.” Hope said. “Father William used the fear tech on Bellamy, and because you had been near it as well, there could have been particles of it in you.”

“That could be how it drew our minds together, yes. That and our shared blood. Since our shared blood worked to draw our minds together with the fear tech, then I am certain that Father William’s new hypothesis is correct. If Bellamy takes my blood, or anyone’s since they all connect back to me in the end, it will obliterate the entire network. He can never know our world.”

“Is there no option to kill it with a word? Like I did for ours?” Hope asked. “The words did work. I felt no one, I was completely out.”

“Only if Father William added a kill code to it when he created it. Which seems unlikely.”

“I’m sorry.” Niylah said, resting a hand on Octavia’s shoulder. “But at least you’ll have each other again.”

Octavia rested her hand over Niylah’s and gave it a soft squeeze. “We’ll all have each other.”

**_OMPHALOS - CADOGAN’S MANSION - EVENING_ **

Bellamy awoke with a start, chest heaving as he caught his breath.

_Okay, think. I won’t have much time before Cadogan is here, if any time at all. I’ll listen to what he has to tell me, and not tell him much in return. When I know what he’s looking for, then I’ll know how to talk to him._

It was a plan. Whether it would be a good plan or not, that remained to be seen.

Bellamy continued taking large gulping breaths, feigning some amount of terror, remembering what Octavia had said about the tech in his veins and what it was supposed to do, until she’d intervened.

“Welcome back, Mr Blake.”

Bellamy opened his eyes warily, darting them around the room, though from the position of the voice he knew Cadogan was near the doors.

“I trust your experience has been… educational?”

Bellamy nodded furiously, really playing up the part, pulling at the restraints that still held him down.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Cadogan stepped closer, loosening the restraints, letting Bellamy sit up properly.

Bellamy rubbed his raw wrists without a word, checking for deeper injuries, thankfully there were none.

“Why would you give me something like that?” Bellamy asked, keeping his eyes down.

“Mankind and technology were never supposed to coexist in these ways. Now you understand why. How it could be used. My sister, yours… they never understood that. Why else would Omphalos exist the way it has for millennia? We’ve had the ability to make this sort of technology, but we don’t, because we knew what that would do.”

“So what’s going to happen to us?”

Cadogan took a seat in a chair next to the bed. “Once you’ve destroyed the tech, then you and your people will leave here and return to Gaia - or Sanctum, as you know it - and get in your ship and return to Terra - your Earth.”

“You won’t do anything to stop us?”

“No. You will be safe, you have my word. Your sister did do good work there to restore your world, you will have an entire planet at your disposal.”

“But we still know about Omphalos. We know about the keystone. Doesn’t that worry you?”

“I destroyed the keystone connection to Terra from this side. As for the rest, you might know about us now, but as generations pass, the stories will all pass into legend, like they all do in the end. We’re not concerned. We play the long game here.”

“I have a question about this place.”

“Go on.”

“Why do you hide yourselves from the other worlds?”

“There has to be one place in the universe where humanity will always endure in a perfect state. Humanity can be volatile. You know that better than anyone.”

“Then why isn’t it here? What is it about this world that _isn’t_ volatile?”

“We’ve had millennia to educate ourselves on the human mind, how to address problems in the mind before they become dangerous. Your sister upset the apple cart. When she first arrived, there were too many on the council who were sympathetic to her hard life, and while she was prescribed a treatment plan, her doctor grew even more sympathetic to her plight and was the one who encouraged the travesty she created.”

“But she can’t be the only one. How is it that you and your sister came to be on Earth, if travel to other planets was forbidden unless it was a restoration or recolonization mission?”

“We did break the law, it’s true. My father was a bad man. That’s why my mother sent me far away with my newborn sister. She didn’t want her to suffer the way we had.”

“So what happened to him? Was he allowed to continue his reign of terror?”

“No. After I took my sister to Terra, my mother turned him in. He was imprisoned, then mind-wiped and sent as part of a recolonization force to a different planet.”

“Then this world isn’t perfect. You still have prisons, you still have people who do awful things.”

“What?” Cadogan blinked, and then shook his head. “You don’t need to worry about here. You and your sister and your people are going back to your Earth.”

“But what about the people here? What’s to prevent someone like your father from appearing again? What’s to prevent someone from taking authoritarian control of this society and murdering people who they felt were on the wrong side?”

Bellamy had seen this in Octavia’s memories, had heard Hope’s story, of how this was precisely what Cadogan had been doing over the days and weeks that led up to Octavia’s return to Sanctum. But was Cadogan self-aware enough to realize it?

“I told you, it isn’t your concern.”

“But it is. I’ve spent years focused on the survival of the human race. I can’t stop that now. I need to be sure that when my sister and I leave here, that this world will be what you say it will be. That the human race will endure. Can you promise me that? Can you promise me that never again will people here have to fear for their lives like you did as a child? That there won’t need to be anyone else like you, who is tasked to take his sister to a whole new world, so she doesn’t suffer like they did? That there won’t be someone else like you who has to sacrifice and sacrifice and sacrifice to give their sister everything they never had? Can you promise that your world will be _perfect?”_ Bellamy stressed the final word, watching closely for Cadogan’s reaction.

Cadogan stepped back from Bellamy, suspicion appearing on his face. “It was not a sacrifice to give my sister the world. I just wish she’d seen reason and returned to this one.”

“But why? I understand why you wanted to come back here. It was your home. It is where you grew up. But Earth was the only world your sister knew. Why would she give that up to chase after your stories?”

“She was a scientist. She could have perfect knowledge here. Why would she turn that down?”

“Maybe perfection isn’t what she was after.”

Cadogan laughed. “That’s for sure. She didn’t want to admit that Terra was a lost cause. Not even after it ended.”

“I know a thing or two about lost causes.” Bellamy said, standing up from the bed, but keeping his stance non-threatening, enough so that Cadogan remained seated. “I used to think I was one. I thought my sister to be one too. I’ve faced so many _lost causes_ and _hopeless situations_ to know that nothing is ever so lost or hopeless as long as there’s someone willing to fight for it.”

“And look where fighting got my sister. Look where fighting got yours.”

“Into some pretty tough situations, that’s for sure. Yeah. But then they also broke free from them. Then they broke free from _us_ and that’s where they were able to grow. I get it, that’s terrifying. You grew up with no control over your life, so when you were free from this place, you wanted to give your sister everything. You wanted to control everything so that you could give her perfect. But nothing is ever perfect. Not on Earth, not in Sanctum, and not here. If this world was perfect, you would never have had to leave.”

“I only wanted what was best for her. As you did.”

“What you considered best for her is not the same as what she considered best for herself. The decision wasn’t yours to make. What she did with her life, both the triumphs and the mistakes, were hers to make. Not yours. But you took one of her mistakes and made it all of our mistake. Which is what brings us here today.”

“What brings us here today is your sister’s technology, not mine.”

“My sister’s technology would not exist if you had not freed ALIE. If you had not ended life as we knew it on Earth. My sister and I would have never been born on the Ark, never would have gone to Earth. Never would have experienced two more apocalypses on Earth, never would have gone to Sanctum, never would have come here. So if you want to see who has brought us here today, look in the mirror.”

Bellamy watched Cadogan carefully, and he could see how the man was starting to get uncomfortable. Not panicked enough to call for assistance, and as long as Bellamy could keep that tempo, he had a chance of getting through.

“So I ask again - why do you hide yourself from the other worlds?” Bellamy questioned, looking Cadogan straight in the eye. “If you know minds so well, if you claim that you can prevent problems before they start - then why don’t you? How was your father able to rise to his power where he hurt you without someone stopping it? And why not send that knowledge into the other worlds when they’re reclaimed for human habitation?”

Bellamy began to circle around Cadogan, and the man didn’t move a muscle.

“I’ll tell you why. Because it has nothing to do with perfect. That’s just the story you tell yourselves. It is actually about control and about feeling superior. That’s why my sister’s technology threatens you, because it removes that control. It acknowledges that people aren’t _perfect,_ but that people can be _better_ when they work together.”

“You’re wrong.”

“Why?”

“We only want what’s best for the universe.”

“That decision isn’t yours to make. Not for the other planets, and not for this one either. As I understand it, many of the leaders here have embraced my sister’s technology. Because they understand what you don’t. They understand that we’re all imperfect creatures, and that’s what makes us human. They recognize that centuries, maybe even millennia, of your people here had lost their humanity by ignoring that very core truth of what makes us so.”

“You never had any intention of helping me.” Cadogan glared at Bellamy, but still didn’t make any moves, just clenching and unclenching his fists.

“I do want to help you. But destroying what my sister has built is not going to be the way I am going to do that.”

“Then you can’t help me.”

“I can. I know how you feel, you were right about that. I know what it’s like to sacrifice your life and never feel like it is your own because you were given a responsibility you weren’t ready for. A responsibility with lives at stake should you screw it up. But there is a point at which that responsibility ends. Your sister was your responsibility. But she’s not anymore. Continuing to resent that responsibility now doesn’t do anything - not for you, not for her. I believe you may know a famous quote from Earth - resentment is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.”

“My sister is dead. Your sister is the problem now.”

“My sister has brought peace to a large part of the universe and that peace is growing every day. It took me a long time to see that, and even longer to see what she was capable of without me dictating it to her.”

“Your sister was the leader of a cannibal gladiator cult.”

“She was.” Bellamy admitted, moving to stand between Cadogan and the door. “And now she’s not. We can all rise above and let go of our pasts so that we can find a better future. She’s done that. You can do that too, by putting to rest the demons of your past. Reconcile with your sister, and let her go. Release her from being your responsibility. That’s the only way you’re going to be able to move forward.”

“Even if I wanted to, how in the world could I do that? My sister is dead. I had her killed.”

“Her body is dead, but her mind survives.”

“Within the Flame? That nonsense again?”

“It isn’t nonsense. Her mind was there. Now it isn’t, because the Flame has been destroyed, but her consciousness was not. She escaped it. Right now, she is protecting my people from Sheidheda. The one you said hungered for power. You can help us, you can help her, by helping us destroy him.”

“I can talk to her again?” Cadogan was still wary, but Bellamy saw a flicker of hope in his eyes, so he kept going.

“Yes. You can talk to her. You can tell her that you are going to break the cycle. That you’re not going to make the same mistakes you made before. That you’re going to do right by her and stop the man who corrupted her life’s work. And that you’re going to support what she was working towards, the work she wasn’t able to finish, but that my sister did.”

“If you think I’m going to put your sister’s tech in my mind, think again.”

“You don’t have to take the tech if you don’t want to. That is your choice. All we ask is that you stop denying that choice to others. Let them make that choice for themselves. I know you grew up feeling like you had no choices. I can’t even imagine what growing up with your father could have been like. And then to be given a child to take to another world - I’m sure you felt you didn’t have choices then either. But now you do. Now you have a choice. Please, I beg of you, make the right one.”

“I already made a choice.” Cadogan looked away. “There’s no changing that.”

“You’re wrong. It is always possible to change your mind. I once told my sister there’s no coming back from what she was going to do, but I was wrong. If you want to, if you truly want to make a change - make a different choice. That path is open to you now.”

“Some things are set in motion that cannot be undone.” Cadogan stood up and faced Bellamy, who stood his ground, but Cadogan’s movements were slow and not aggressive. His expression was soft, sad, even. “Even if I make a different choice now, in this moment, there’s still a cost to come that I can’t take back.”

“You can call off your people. Just one call, and you can ask them to stop whatever they’re doing. Unless you don’t think they’ll listen to you?”

“It has nothing to do with my people. It has to do with you. I’m sorry, Mr Blake, but there are some things I can’t take back, and you and your sister will pay the price for it.”

Bellamy’s hand went to the injection site on his neck. “You gave me something, didn’t you?”

Cadogan nodded. “I’m sorry. I could do all of the things you’re asking of me, help my sister, put things to rest with her, but I can’t take back this.”

“What did you do?”

“The anti-tech that would destroy your sister’s work is in your veins. If she gives you her blood, then the force of that shared DNA would collide and destroy her entire network.”

Bellamy thought about how somehow he’d just shared a mind with his sister, this fear tech that she seemed to know something about - had she been exposed to it too, at some point? Was that how it brought their minds together - drawing on their shared blood?

He thought back to what they’d said to each other in his mind, her tears in a moment when they seemed out of place, and she’d brushed it off as nothing, just emotions over how they’d finally reconciled. But the tears had seemed deeper than that.

“She knew.” Bellamy said to himself. “Somehow she knew.”

“What’s that?” Cadogan asked, expression hardening again after its earlier vulnerability.

“Whatever you tried to do to me, some sort of fear technology, it didn’t work. It brought my sister into my mind instead. I guess she had been exposed to it too.”

“So you know I’m telling the truth. You know that it can’t be undone. You can never know her world. It will create an unbridgeable chasm between you that will only grow over time. You’ll grow to resent her again, and despite everything you just said to me, you’ll let that resentment fester. It’ll grow. And one day it will consume you too and there will be no way out for you, especially as you begin to age but she remains forever young, you won’t be able to stand it anymore. You won’t be able to stand _her_ anymore.”

Bellamy shook his head as he looked at Cadogan’s determined expression. “I know what you’re trying to do. This isn’t about me. This is about you.”

“You know what I’m saying is right. You know that anger that will grow inside you. That anger that lives in all of us, you’re right, this place isn’t perfect, and that anger has had decades to grow in my heart, ever since I was a child.” Cadogan started to circle Bellamy now, expression growing despondent. “I may have spent hundreds of years in cryosleep, but that didn’t change anything. I’m still that man that killed his sister.”

“You are. And you’re going to have to live with that, because this is not going to work. I’m not going to kill you.”

“You’ve killed hundreds if not thousands, what’s one more?” 

“You have to face it. You have to face what you’ve done. And I know, that’s the scariest thing in the world. But I’ve had to look into the faces of people who I’ve tried to kill, the faces of the family members of people who I _have_ killed, and through all of that I have learned. About myself, about the world. And now when we walk out of here I’m going to have to face my sister, face to face in the flesh for the first time since I thought she died in my arms, now knowing all of her story which I didn’t have before, and I could very well end up begging her to end my life like you are begging me now. But I know she wouldn’t do it. And I won’t either.”

“Don’t I deserve death? After everything I’ve done? To my sister, to yours? To the people here, to the billions on Earth who died after I set ALIE free?”

“A wise man once told me that death is a gift of peace that we don’t deserve. That we have to live, breathe and suffer with what we’ve done. That’s what we owe to the people whose lives we’ve taken. You don’t deserve death. You deserve to spend the rest of your days trying to put right all of your mistakes. You do better today than you did yesterday.”

“You really believe that?”

“I do. And if you care at all about your sister, you will believe it too, because you can finally put right a mistake that you made hundreds of years ago. Will you do it?”

Cadogan took a deep breath, averting his gaze from Bellamy’s, taking a long moment to think. About what he’d done, about what he _could_ do, Bellamy wasn’t sure, but he did notice the determination in the older man’s features as he squared his shoulders and straightened up, turning back to face him.

“I’ll do it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Coming after the canon season 7 is over:
> 
> _**7x10 Without Hope of Reward** \- Cadogan is called to account for his crimes against the people of Omphalos. Meanwhile, in Sanctum, Sheidheda makes a bold move._
> 
> Be sure to subscribe to the series (OsleyaKomWonkru's Season 7 of The 100) so that you get updates for the whole season and not just the individual episodes!


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